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Reading The Pictures is dedicated to the analysis of news photos and media images.

September 27, 2009

Terror in the Post Bush Era: A More Civil War

guest post byKaren Hull

More reminders that the “terror bust” is a changing political art.

Bush Era terrorism suspects were portrayed as cartoons: oversimplified, wiped of detail and substance, and then shouted out in breaking news across cable programming. The 2006 “Miami 7” and their wistful fantasy to blow up Chicago’s Sears Tower, the Michigan cell phone terrorists, and politically timed “terror alerts” come to mind as post-9/11 souvenirs.

But the recent apprehension of New York resident Najibullah Zazi and other, unrelated arrests in several U.S. cities aren’t getting the media attention (or hysteria) once reserved for such events.

Is the media taking a clue from the more understated Obama administration? No attorney general press conferences or duck tape admonitions. No political grandstanding. Here, in contrast, is the straight-forward New York Times background article on Najibullah Zazi describing the suspect’s complex past.

And the accompanying photo? If the sea rescue helicopter is a little exotic, what we otherwise have is: an arrest.